Modesty Is For Suckers

I feel like I’m in some kind of time warp. This time last year, all five of my kids were in good places in their lives. Happy. Healthy. Good jobs, good lives. I wrote about it here: March 31, 2015, because Chris was moving out, heading into the life he’d worked really hard to make. Years and years of struggle, pain, anxiety, depression, and he was happy. Really happy. Everyone was.

Then came June and he was gone. Just like that.

And, just like that, everything started to rewind. My youngest daughter, who’d been happy both professionally and personally, suddenly found herself in bad situations with both. My oldest son and his then fiancee lost their apartment when the owner decided to sell. He, she, a dog and two cats ended up moving in here. Both daughter and son struggled through personal and professional debacles. We helped them all we could, lent a hand when they reached out for one and (hopefully) stepped out of the way before boundaries were crossed. Our lives were suddenly and once again complicated with children now adults and their adult problems. And then there was the grief. Such intense grief for all of us. Our two oldest have families of their own, and I think they largely escaped the whirlwind in this house, even if they still had to deal with their grief.

Around the turn of the year, things seemed to halt their careening rewind and, after a pause for breath, started winding forward again. Daughter got a new apartment, settled in a good working situation, and fell in love. Son and his fiancee hit a rough patch that ended in a break-up I don’t think either of them saw coming. She took the dog. He kept the cats. And now he’s the one moving out. To Portland, Oregon. He’s taking the chance he didn’t take several years ago when his bandmates headed west. He’s on his way right now.

And here we are, once again: empty nesters. I’m thrilled son is off on the adventure he not only wants, but needs. I’m ecstatic daughter is happy in Brooklyn. But Chris…he’s not out on his own, living his life. The nest emptied in a way I can’t be happy about.

I truly am looking forward to being just me and Frankie D. To the relative quiet, to the freedom of being responsible for only ourselves on a daily basis. We all love our kids, but no one can dispute that things get quieter once they’re out of the house. This time last year, I was excited about that quiet. After that massive rewind, I can’t say I’m excited. I’m…heedful. There’s no going back to that innocence, the wonder of a life opening up and spreading out before me like a gift. I see the shadows now, the little ruts and ridges on the path that warn, “Don’t go too fast! Watch your step! There are bears in these here woods!”

But here I am, on that path I’ve been looking forward to since I had my first baby, because I’m not the kind of mom who ever wanted to keep her kids forever. I didn’t wish my babies back, or “endure” their teens. I have been madly in love with them through every stage in their lives. I still am. It’s just that our nest isn’t the same kind of empty it was this time last year. It’s got a ragged hole where one fell out rather than flew.

The forward momentum continues despite the ruts, ridges and bears. I head into my future a little more warily, but no less optimistically. Because there are flowers in the wood, too, and treasures along the rutted path. The benefit of treading a bit more carefully is that I’ll spot them more often than I otherwise would have.

Peace.

Crystal child. I’d never heard the term before.  I don’t mean this kind, interesting as it is. Let me backtrack, just a little.

Chris had an amazing psychiatrist. I credit him with giving us our son back, and fully believe that without him, we’d have lost Chris three years earlier than we did. Frank and I still go to see him. It’s a connection neither he nor we wish to break. Losing Chris was devastating for him, too. They weren’t just patient/doctor; they were friends.

With Chris’ birthday coming, we wanted to get together. In the course of our discussion, he said that, in his opinion, there was nothing so gut-wrenching as losing a child. End of story. But losing a crystal child comes with an added category of grief–knowing not just we but the larger world is denied what he would have given it.

A crystal child is brilliant, multifaceted, and fragile. That was Chris. The stuff locked away in that head of his, that he tried so hard to put out into the world? Gone. Talk to his professors, high school teachers, middle school, elementary. Talk to colleagues, friends, gym acquaintances. Brilliant doesn’t quite cut it. He was able to help others connect with concepts they thought beyond them. He tutored a lot in college, and he loved it. But there was so much in him he couldn’t share. Not that he didn’t try! He talked about things people didn’t quite grasp. Some simply weren’t interested. To have a brain full of knowledge to share and no one to share it with weighed on him, I know. It made him feel disconnected from his peers, and was one of the reasons he always felt apart. When he got going with someone who did understand and was interested? Holy jeez, sparks would fly out of his eyes, ears. His happiness, then, was breathtaking.

A professor recently told me that when he saw Chris coming, he’d put away whatever he was doing because he knew he was in for several hours of discussion. I’m certain there were times the man really didn’t have hours to spend with Chris, but he did, because he knew it was going to leave him feeling excited about…something. It made him remember, he said, what it was like to be twenty-something and enthusiastic about his chosen field of study. He also said Chris was light years beyond what he could get his head around, even after all his years teaching.

When we lost Chris, we lost a beloved son. He was goofy and sweet, gave amazing hugs. And he loved. So much. His smile was legendary. Cocky little bastard. He was never going to be easy. He could be infuriating, self-centered and, yes, a little arrogant. There’s that multifaceted thing–can’t point to one characteristic that didn’t reflect/deflect another. He might have always needed more than those who love him sometimes had to give. But that’s only a small portion of what HE had to give.

I’m his mother. Of course I knew he was “special.” In so many ways, Chris was the strongest person I’ll ever know. All he endured, how hard he strove to overcome every physical and mental obstacle that came at him–few could have faced all he did and come out the other side in one piece. His fragility is of a more subtle kind, a deadlier kind. The kind that hides within all the apparent toughness and strikes hard where it finds a crack.

Today is Christofer’s birthday. He should have been twenty-six. We’re never going to know what he’d have given the world. Good, bad, or otherwise. But I do know that our loss isn’t just ours, even if no one else ever does.